The WALSINGHAM PROJECT aims to provide a Catholic response to the de-Christianization and islamization of Europe and the West.

Following John Paul II’s Encyclical Fides et Ratio, the WALSINGHAM PROJECT has two aspects: it is spiritual and formative.

Join the revival of the Prayer Crusade for the conversion of England, started by the Venerable Ignatius Spencer, a great convert from Anglicanism; and Blessed Dominic Barberi (who converted the famous John Henry Newman). Both were Passionist fathers who dedicated their lives to the conversion of England.

learn more about Henry VIII’s book “Defence of the Seven Sacraments”, in order to help Anglicans and eventually the Protestants and Lutherans recover the correct perspective about the Sacraments, indulgences and papal primacy, as expounded by the founder of the Church of England, Henry VIII, prior to his falling into schism. Henry VIII received the title of ‘Defender of the Faith’ by Pope Leo X. He counted on the assistance of Saints Thomas More and John Fisher. It is a prime example of Catholic orthodoxy.

TWO REASONS WHY IS THIS BEING DONE NOW

ONE: Europe is being de-Christianized beyond recognition and exposed to cultural and demographic islamization.

TWO: over 400,000 Anglicans and counting have requested full sacramental communion with the Holy See – the first time in centuries that an instance of mass conversion takes place.

WHAT ARE THE CONSEQUENCES OF DE-CHRISTIANIZATION?

In July 2005, in the course of an impromptu address to some 140 priests of the Aosta diocese in Italy, Pope Benedict XVI referred to the widespread religious indifference that is rampant in Europe and the Western society in general. He said that “The so-called great churches seem to be dying, especially in Australia and Europe, but not so much in the United States”.

The Catholic Church in Australia and Europe was not excluded from his mention of the ‘dying churches’. But the death of the great churches does not leave a vacuum. When religion and culture disappear, other religion(s) and culture(s) take their place. Thus, which culture and religion are making great strides in Europe and most of the West today? Islam.

SPIRITUAL:

FORMATIVE:

THE PRAYER CRUSADE FOR THE CONVERSION OF ENGLAND

By Raymond and Theresa de Souza

(Note: Our Lady of Walsingham is the medieval Patroness of England, in whose shrine Henry VIII and many English Kings and Queens

The German theologian and personal secretary of Pope Benedict XVI, Fr. Georg Gänswein, alerted the international community about the threat of the islamization of Europe. He declared to the German paper Süddeutsche Zeitung (26 July 2007):

“One must not ignore the attempts to Islamize Europe, and the Catholic Church clearly sees this danger. This kind of attitude may present a risk for European identity.”

If Europe and the Christian West are to survive as Christian and as Western in this new millennium, with any hope of repelling the Islamization of European culture, the reunification of Christians is necessary. In 2003, we were talking to a priest at the Vatican Secretariat of State. He did not hide his deep concerns. He said that ‘either Europe remains somewhat Christian, or it will become Muslim. We cannot live together in peace’.

Naturally. Ecumenism with Islam does not work. They want world supremacy. We would not be surprised if this somber perspective were among the reasons that led Pope Benedict XVI to call for a Year of Saint Paul, the great Gospel preacher.

WHY ENGLAND? WHAT ABOUT OTHER COUNTRIES IN EUROPE?

There are strong reasons to believe that England will be the spearhead of great historical conversions in Europe. In 1857 Don Bosco related to Blessed Pius IX a vision of St. Dominic Savio:

‘One morning, while I was doing my thanksgiving after Holy Communion, I was taken by a strong distraction. It seemed that I was on a very vast flat land surface, full of people surrounded by thick darkness. They were walking, but did so as though they had lost their way and could not see where they set their feet. Someone beside me said, ‘This region is

England.’

Then I saw the Supreme Pontiff, Pius IX. He was dressed in a majestic fashion, carrying in his hands a splendorous light, and advancing amidst the multitude of people. As He advanced, the darkness gradually disappeared and the people were bathed with so much light that it seemed noon time. The friend said, ‘This light is the Catholic Religion, which must illuminate England.’

Pius IX said to Don Bosco: ‘This narration confirms in me my determination to work without rest in favor of England, which is already the object of all my solicitudes.’ (Apud Memorie Biografiche di Don Giovanni Bosco, compiled by Fr. Giovanni Battista Lemoyne S.D.B.; and in part the Spanish version of Fr. Rodolfo Fierro S.D.B., published in Biografía y escritos de San Juan Bosco, BAC, Madri, 1955).

In 1854, the famous Curé d’Ars was talking to Archbishop Ullathorne, of Birmingham, England, when suddenly the saintly curé interrupted him and said: ‘Mais, Monseigneur, je crois que l’Eglise d’Anglaterre retournera à son ancienne splendeur.’ (‘But, Monsignor, I believe that the Church in England will recover her ancient splendor.’) (Cf. ‘The Curé D’Ars’, by Abbé Francis Trochu, TAN Books, Rockford, Illinois, 1977, p.511).

THEREFORE:

In Her apparition at La Salette, France, on 19th September, 1846, the BlessedVirgin Mary said to the boy Maximin (one of the two seers): “A Protestant nation in the north shall be converted to the Faith, and through the means of that nation, the others shall return to the Holy Catholic Church”. It happened merely four years prior to the emancipation of the Catholic Hierarchy in England.

In 1895 Pope Leo XIII wrote the Encyclical Amantissima Voluntatis, inviting the English to pray together with him towards the final reunification. He issued a special prayer for the conversion of England, and enriched it with indulgences. Thus, we firmly believe that the reunification of all baptized Christians is of the essence. As long as our separated brethren in baptism remain fragmented into thousands of denominations, with a wide variety of creeds and moral codes, all claiming to derive their interpretations from the Bible, Christianity - weakened as it is by the influence of secularism and the Culture of Death - will not stand a chance against Islam.

WHAT ABOUT ‘DEFENCE OF THE SEVEN SACRAMENTS’? WHAT MAKES IT SO SPECIAL?

Most Christians identify King Henry VIII as a co-founder of the Protestant Reformation, along with Martin Luther. However, prior to his severing ties with Rome, Henry was an accomplished theologian and staunch defender of the Catholic Faith.

He was even granted the title, Defender of the Faith, by Pope Leo X.

In ‘Defence of the Seven Sacraments’, King Henry launched a scathing rebuke of Martin Luther’s rejection of the Church’s 1,500-year sacramental heritage. No-holds-barred, Henry refutes Luther’s novel interpretation of the ordinary means of grace given to the Church by Jesus Christ.

After Henry’s death and especially during the reign of Elizabeth I, his treatise on the Sacraments was buried with him. The Catholic Church was systematically dismantled and destroyed in England. This not only separated Englishmen from most of the sacramental life of Christ’s Church, but also started a Cultural Revolution that helped bring about a profound moral relativism and decadence in European society.

The book has been printed only three times in the last 480 years. The last edition was made in 1907, in the United States, and was beautifully prefaced by Cardinal James Gibbons of Baltimore. In order to emphasize Henry VIII’s orthodoxy, the New Millennium edition has over 100 quotations from the Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church.

Defence of the Seven Sacraments is available from

http://saintgabriel-international.com/catalog.htm

170 YEARS AFTER: THE PRAYER CRUSADE FOR THE CONVERSION OF ENGLAND REVIVES!

Venerable Ignatius Spencer, of the same family as Princess Diana, a Passionist father and convert from Anglicanism, started the Crusade and preached it throughout England and Ireland asking the people to pray for the conversion of England. Pope Pius IX gave a special blessing to the Crusade and granted indulgences to the prayers. Blessed Dominic Barberi became the champion of this Crusade.

We are revitalizing the Crusade, in view of England’s special role in Divine Providence’s plans and within Europe’s process of de-Christianization and islamization. Join the Prayer Crusade (the spiritual aspect) and promote the book of Henry VIII (the formation aspect), abiding by the exhortation of Pope John Paul II in the encyclical letter “Faith and Reason.”

‘Defence of the Seven Sacraments’ is a unique book: it is the Royal Book of Catholic apologetics, authored by a King, assisted by a Saint, acclaimed by a Pope. The new Millennium Edition of ‘Defence of the Seven Sacraments’ is dedicated to Her Majesty Elizabeth II, the 21st Monarch to accede to the English Throne after Henry VIII.

Carmelite monasteries in North America and Europe have pledged their prayers for the success of this initiative. You can read some of their responses online.

Raymond de Souza is available for comments and interviews in English, French, Spanish or Portuguese.

Tel: (570) 788 5400Raymond@KeysofPeter.org

www.KEYSOFPETER.org